Microsoft to Acquire aQuantive, Inc. — Company details plans to build Internet-wide advertising platform for advertisers, publishers and ad agencies. — Microsoft Corp. today announced it will acquire aQuantive, Inc., for $66.50 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $6 billion.

aQuantive: Who are these guys? — The instant messages and emails about Microsoft's $6 billion purchase of aQuantive go something like this: — "Whoa that's a big deal." — "I'd hate to be short aQuantive." — "If Microsoft was going to spend that much why didn't it just buy Doubleclick?"

WPP Buys 24/7 Real Media For $649 Million — ENDING WEEKS OF SPECULATION, WPP Group on Thursday announced plans to buy online ad company 24/7 Real Media for $649 million in cash. — WPP, the world's second-largest marketing services company, is paying $11.75 per share for the company …

Microsoft Popfly service does mashups — Microsoft, long known for catering to the geekiest of programmers, on Friday introduced a Web mashup builder for the rest of us. — The hosted service, called Popfly and now in alpha testing, gives consumers a visual way to create a Web site or add features …

Rumour: Google to buy Feedburner — I have just heard from a VERY trusted source that Google is buying Feedburner in order to get into the rapidly evolving RSS Ad market. The delay in announcing the deal, I am told is solely due to the delay in closing out the DoubleClick deal.

Rumor: Apple issuing pre-release builds of OS X 10.4.10 — With the postponement of Leopard until at least October having quieted the speculation (at least for a bit), attention has turned to what Apple will be doing with Tiger in the meantime. There are still a good few months until Leopard comes along …

Global net censorship 'growing' — The level of state-led censorship of the net is growing around the world, a study of so-called internet filtering by the Open Net Initiative suggests. — The study of thousands of websites across 120 Internet Service Providers and found 25 …

House Dems: broadband isn't broadband unless it's 2Mbps — Saying that the FCC "has not kept pace with the times or the technology," Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) opened a hearing today into the FCC's methods for measuring broadband availability in the US. The US lags in speed, availability …

Yahoo 'censored' Flickr comments — Yahoo has been accused of censorship on its popular photo website Flickr, in a row that has highlighted the issue of copyright in the online age. — Earlier this month photographer Rebekka Gudleifsdóttir discovered that seven of her pictures …

Fair Isaac Claims Pay-Per-Click Fraud Is 10% to 15% — Google disputes the figures and has consistently taken issue with the methodology and motives of those reporting significant levels of click fraud. — At the InterACT Conference in San Francisco on Friday, Joseph Milana …